Modi or Rahul ? Neither !

Modi or Rahul ? Neither !

I am not a fan of Narendra Modi. Even if his dubious claims of development are true even 10% , he has to still answer for the post-Godhra riots in which 2000 muslims were killed. And now he has to answer for fake encounters as well. We cannot afford to have such leaders in India…or anywhere else for that matter.

When I express my opinions on Modi, I am immediately told by Modi sympathizers (read as ignorant BJP/ VHP/ RSS bigots ) about how Kasmiri Pandits were / are being killed and have been exiled from Kashmir to live in refuge camps. Stories about the corruption of the Nehru-Gandhi family, their “non-Indian” origin are also brought out. The latest is some  fantastic story on Sanjay Gandhi’s paternity.

I am often left wondering about the intellectual morbidity and hopelessness of the people who parade these arguments.. and I am sure some comments to this post will bring more. Some BJP idiot went to the extent of saying Amartya Sen had no right to say anything about Godhra/ Modi as he (Sen ) was neither Indian nor a Muslim. It is like saying that no non-German/ non Jew could logically criticize Hitler for the millions of Jews he killed.

My response is simple>

Just because I do not approve of Modi does not automatically make me a supporter of the Congress / Nehru Gandhi family. I am NOT their supporter. The congress and its ruling dynasty have also a lot to answer for, the topmost being humongous corruption and the killing of 3500 plus sikhs in Delhi. I am hoping a strong non-Congress government will soon punish those guilty.

Two wrongs do not make a right. We cannot hope to balance the deaths of Hindus with the deaths of Muslims… they were all Indians and they were all human beings .. and no one should have been killed.

I do not believe in the Modi or Rahul debate. It is NOT Modi vs Rahul for me . Neither is fit to be a PM. One for his communal sentiment and the other for his inexperience.

PS: extremely sad to see Manmohan again saying he thinks Rahul is fit to be PM. Manmohan has not only mis-managed the government , he is stooping to new lows in chamchagiri. Wonder how much he is being paid to make these starements.

A Sweeping statement

A sweeping statement

Recently (Aug 2013) in a protest against the division of Andhra Pradesh some home makers and employees took to sweeping roads a a mark of protest. (http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-08-06/hyderabad/41131152_1_seemandhra-priests-samaikhyandhra) I don’t know if this form proof protest is unique to India, but I know it has been around in India for quite some time. In the 70’s and 80’s when unemployment among educated professionals (doctors, engineers) was high, this was reported frequently. Then as employment opportunities rose, it became less frequent and has surfaced only now after about 15 years.

Now my point is this: why is sweeping roads considered a form of protest? When I applied my mind it struck me hat that these were upper caste people trying to show the world that some problem had virtually degraded them to sweepers, who are traditionally lower caste in India. And what can be worse for an upper caste to be demoted in the caste hierarchy !!

But look at it from the point of someone who actually sweeps the roads for a living. How does it make her/him feel when they are used as an example of degradation ? Not very happy I am sure. Not only do they have a difficult life, here are upper caste people making an example of their misery.

Sweeping is also looked down in other cultures for sure, but I have not heard of it being used as a protest-symbol for degradation. I wish the people in India who use it as a protest would apply their minds and come up with some other form of protest.

Fair and Lovely !! Really ?

Fair and Lovely !! Really ? 
 
I just read a week back that the skin whitening cream market size in India is now Rs 5000 cr … and that’s an enormous waste.

Where do we Indians get this fascination for fair / white skin ? From our supposed Aryan links ? From The British raj ? I really do not know… but I am just not able to understand this fixation. While I do not dislike fair skin, I definitely prefer the “original” wheatish/ dusky shades. Remember Smita Patil ? and Rekha ?

Fair and Lovely and similar products are actually creating a division in society.. fair Vs not fair.. and through clever advertising suggesting that the use of their fairness products leads to enhanced confidence, success, etc. All this complete nonsense but the irony is that they depend on the ingrained attitudes to skin colour in India.

Now what is galling is some of the most respected corporate names are doing this. Reputed MNCs and Indian companies are milking gullible young women. And this is also happening in Africa, Latin America, China, Pakistan and South East Asia

And the last nail in the coffin is fairness creams for men. !! Come on guys ..Rama, Krishna and Shiva ..were all dark.

Just for the record, the active chemical in all skin whitening creams removes skin pigmentation by bleaching and peeling. The worst of the lot can leave behind burn marks and cause skin cancer..

Have you ever wondered ..Cont’d

Have you ever wondered ..Cont’d Have you ever wondered why human babies are born after 9 months of gestation.. Not 8 or 7 or 10 or 11 ?

Ok, so there are two opposing forces in nature that determine the gestation period (for all mammal species, not just humans) . The first is that the longer the baby is inside the mother the stronger it becomes and has a better chance of survival in the outside world . Remember premature babies are born at 7 months and can also survive with medical care. So technically a baby has a chance of outside survival at 7 months but spends an extra 2 months inside the womb to improve its chances of survival.

The restriction to the length of the gestation period (i.e. beyond 9 months) comes from the size of the birth canal / uterine/ vaginal opening. The baby is continuously growing in the womb. If the baby is too big at the time of birth , there will problems for it to come out.

So 9 months appears to be the optimum. The baby is big enough to survive and the birth will not be dangerous for the mother.

There is another very interesting fact about human birth. As the baby travels down the birth canal, the head twists 90 degrees. So the nose is pointing to the shoulder. This is not seen in any other mammal species. Human babies have very large heads in comparison to other species… because humans also have the largest brain. This twist of the head is necessary for the large head to pass through the birth canal.

Have you ever wondered why...

Have you ever wondered?

Why we feel drowsy / sleepy when the aircraft takes off. ? Well, over a period of time I noticed that for the few minutes immediately after take off, I doze off. Then I checked this with a number of other people. And most, but not all, said they have also had the same experience. Then I googled a bit and presto!! found the reason. Immediately after take-off, the aircraft goes into a steep climb. This causes the blood to temporarily partially drain out of the brain and move to the lower part of the body…and hence the short sleep. After a few minutes, as the aircraft reaches its normal flying height and levels off , the blood flows back to the brain waking us up. Pilots of fighter planes and astronauts go through the same experience, though in a more severe way. Short black-outs are common.

Why condoms are marketed in fruit flavors? Well it’s nothing to do with taste at all. So why the flavors? It is because condoms are made of natural rubber and natural rubber has a slightly unpleasant smell. In order to mask that unpleasant smell, condom manufactures use fruit flavors like banana and strawberry. So why not mango or papaya? Because Banana and strawberry have obvious sexual linkages which mango and papaya do not have.

Why after a sleep/ nap we feel refreshed only after washing the face. There are two reasons. First during sleep/ nap, blood circulation to outer surface of the body reduces. This causes the slight feeling of numbness in the face. While washing the face, we also massage the face and that restores circulation making us feel refreshed. Second, and this is more specific to full length sleep rather than a nap, the natural secretion of oil from facial skin blocks the skin pores, thus preventing the skin from “breathing”. Washing the face removes this film of oil and we feel refreshed.

Zandu Balm or Jhandu balm ?

Zandu Balm or Jhandu balm ?

Many of us have heard the Zandu Balm jingle on TV/ radio… Zandu Balm, Zandu Balm , peeda hari balm (peeda hari is pain relieving) . Till some years ago, whenever I heard this jingle, there would be a dissonance in my mind . The spelling of the product in English was Zandu whereas the jingle was pronouncing the word as Jhandu . For years I lived with this dissonance. Jhandu by the way is derived from Jhanda or flag.

Now Zandu is a Mumbai based company. So one day I mentioned this to a marathi colleague. To my surprise she found nothing wrong, no mis-match in it. On discussing with her, here is what I discovered.

It appears that in Maharashtra the English letter Z is pronounced as Jhed ( actually it is closer to Jhade as in Shade) and not as Zed elsewhere. I will repeat this in Devnagari script . In Hindi Z= ज़ेड (zed) . In Marathi Z= झेड ( jhade). SO quite obviously for a Mumbai company the English spelling of the product as Zandu was correct. So while Zandu might read as ज़ंडू to Hindi speaking people , it is झंडू (Jhandu) to Marathi speaking people.

Some of this confusion can also be seen in Gujarat which adjoins Maharashtra. There is a clan of Kshatriyas known as Jhala Rajputs ( in Hindi झाला ) . They live in Rajasthan and Gujarat. When they spell their name in English, the Rajasthan guys will write Jhala and the Gujarat guys will write Zala.

Purely random things

Purely random things

Below are 2 groups of vegetables/ spices etc. Can someone tell me what is common or different about the 2 groups ? Please leave your answers in comments

1. Potato, tomato, green chillies, cauliflower, cabbage, apple, onion, garlic
2. Sugarcane, karela/ bitter gourd, mango, pepper, banana,  ginger, tamarind, gooseberry/ amla.

When taking a flight do you feel drowsy for a few minutes just after take –off ? I do and so do a lot of people whom I have asked this . The reason is that shortly after take off , the plane makes a very rapid ascent. This drains the blood from the brain and towards the lower part of the body causing a very short period of  black-out or unconsciousness. As the plane levels off (usually 25 to 30 thousand feet) , normal blood flow resumes to the brain and we wake up. Fighter pilots and astronauts face the same problem but in a much more severe degree.

The english media in India refers to the BJP and its associated  groups (RSS , VHP etc) as Saffron parties. The reference to the colour is taken from the Hindutva cause and the   colour saffron which is considered to be the holy colour for Hindus. This is incorrect or at least inexact. The holy colour of Hinduism is known as “Bhagwa” (derived from Bhagwan) and is closer to brick red than saffron. If you see  pictures from the Kumbh Mela , you can see a lot of sadhus in this Bhagwa colour. Saffron is considered auspicious in hindusim but it is not the holy colour.

We have all heard of the Bhagwad Geeta. Ever wondered what this word Bhagwad means ? It’s made of 2 parts Bhag (from Bhagwan) and Vad ("said" . Vad is the Sanskrit root for the verb “to say” ).. So the literal translation of Bhagwad Geeta is the Song that the Lord (Krishna )  sang. In some English translations one can sometimes see the phrase “The Celestial Song” .

Cause and effect: No sneezing matter !

Cause and effect: No sneezing matter

I am one of nature’s logical types. I have a strong belief that anything that happens has a cause, a reason , a logic behind it. And sometimes it is funny.

As a part of my MBA I had to do a summer internship in a different city. I was staying in a hostel which was  a very old bungalow. It had a number of rooms, large and small and a huge drawing room. The doors were at least 7 feet high. It was a typical colonial/ Raj era bungalow, some of which still survive with the railways and the army.

 I shared my room with another MBA student from  a local school. Since he was a local , he had many friends and would return very late at night and go straight to bed. Now in those days there were no mosquito coils and repellants. Each bed was provided with a mosquito net.

After a few days, I noticed a peculiar routine with my room mate, Ramesh. He would come late, quickly change into night clothes and go to bed. The bed would creak a bit as he got in and lay down. After about a minute he would sneeze twice and then go off to sleep. This was an unfailing routine. Always 2 sneezes, not one or three. Always a minute or so after he got into bed. Needless to say, it was very intriguing.

So one weekend I set about trying to solve this mystery of the double sneeze and it did not take long. The mosquito net over Ramesh’s bed had acquired a lot of dust. As he got into bed , the bed got a little jolted and some of this fine dust rained down on Ramesh. This dust spray caused him to sneeze. Once he was already in bed no more jolting , no more dust spray and no more sneezing. That in any case was my deduction.

Now how does one confirm a deduction ? I this case I did it by the inverse route. I took out the mosquito net and dusted it thoroughly and I put it back. That night Ramesh came late as usual and immediately went to bed. But no sneezing !! Not even one. Voila !!

And the same thing happened on subsequent nights… no sneezing !! So after a week of the no-sneeze period I asked Ramesh if he had noticed that he had stopped sneezing. He had not noticed but when I asked him he agreed that he had indeed stopped. I then explained the cause-effect scenario to him.

The amazing Swiss

The amazing Swiss

I spent a few months in Geneva some years back. Among the lesser known facts about the Swiss and Switzerland.
The principal social concepts are cleanliness, neatness and order. Switzerland is squeaky clean ..much cleaner than neighboring Germany or France. Most of this adherence to cleanliness and order is self-regulated.
You will rarely find littering anywhere .. be it city or countryside. Residential areas follow strict waste segregation with as many as 5 categories of waste.. all wonderfully colour coded. In every office you will find a box where people drop used batteries (dry cells/ flashlight batteries). The Swiss claim that they re-cycle 70 % of batteries… and I utterly believe them.
The Swiss love their quietness. Windows in Swiss houses have “shutters” mostly in steel ..in addition to the normal glass windows. These are called “Store” in Switzerland and are like the rolling steel shutters we see for shops in India. Some may be hand cranked and some motorized. Come 10 pm , by some unwritten but inviolable law, millions of windows across all Swiss homes get Store-d. After that no loud music or talking. Most apartment complexes also advise you not to run the washing machine after 8 pm , in order to not disturb the neighbors. If you hear anyone talking loudly on the mobile phone, you can be sure it will NOT be a Swiss citizen.
Dogs: In keeping with the Swiss social concepts, dogs in Switzerland do not bark. They are trained to be non-barking . If you have a dog that barks and do not send it to an obedience school, the neighbors are most likely to complain to the civic authorities who will then fine you and force you to send the dog to an obedience school. Of course , in true Swiss fashion, an obedience school has to be certified by the government and the dog-trainers have to receive a diploma recognized by the government. Trains allow small dogs free and for half-fare for larger dogs.
Nuclear shelters: Swiss law requires that all residential building should have nuclear shelters. Buildings that did not have shelters when the law was passed are required to contribute to building community shelters. Typically the shelters are in the basement of houses and apartment complexes. In many cases the basement also has the apartment’s common washing machine and clothes drying lines (no where in Switzerland will you see laundry hung out to dry in public view.) Now here is the clincher. In the event of a nuclear attack , while the rest of the world will be getting fried, the Swiss will be walking around in clean, freshly laundered clothes !!
Neutrality.The principal of political neutrality , especially in case of wars , is enshrined in the Swiss constitution. It has served the Swiss well. They managed to stay out of the 2 world wars and also gained handsomely with lot of money (legal and illegal) flowing into Swiss banks. Switzerland is one of the very few countries which still requires 2 years of compulsory military service for all adult males above 18… and then one month every alternate year till the age of 40. The one months service is paid for by the employer. There s a joke going around. What is the standard issue weapon for the Swiss Army ..? The Swiss Knife !
For many years Switzerland did not join the Schengen scheme (an alliance of 20 plus European countries that allows free movement of people on a single visa) . Then in 2008 or so the Swiss joined Schengen. Ever since there have been complaints of rising crime rates across the country, especially theft and burglary. It has been attributed to the people coming in from east European countries like Poland and Romania. And the Swiss police have no experience in dealing with crimes. All they had been doing till 2008 was managing traffic !!

IPL 2013 and the Theatre of the Absurd

IPL and the Theatre of the Absurd

Mr Tawde of BJP in Mumbai has opposed the holding of matches in Pune and Mumbai. He says that since the state is currently facing the worst draught in 30 years, the use of water to maintain the pitch/ ground is wasteful.

He has a point, but coming from the MLA of a party whose President Mr Gadkari was recently exposed in a series of murky deals, some of them allegedly involving illegal exploitation of community water resources, it looks like a political stunt to get brownie points.

The Congress and NCP which are joint partners in the ruling coalition have predictably come with a response. They say that the grounds have to be anyway maintained (which is true) and that Mumbai and Pune have no water shortage, which is also true. But there is a problem here. Mumbai and Pune indeed have no water shortage.


What is not widely known however is that water for these 2 cities is piped in from dams built in surrounding areas. These dams have displaced tribals from their lands and they have yet to receive any rehabilitation support from the government. So the Pune and Mumbai aam aadmi showers at the expense of the tribals who have now become non aadmi s. (In a recent TV debate I saw Amartya Sen make this point. In India , the aam aadmi tag has been hijacked by the urban middle class from its rightful owners i.e. the poor in rual and urban areas.)

Please also remember, the NCP (through Mr Pawar) , has a huge stake in the IPL and he always has available the services of the pot-bellied Rajiv Shukla Congress Rajya Sabha MP.

Not to be outdone , the Sena (I don t know which one, Shiv Sena or MNS) has demanded than IPL should donate Rs 500 cr to Maharashtra for the draught. After all why should the Sena be left out when everyone is having a (cricket) ball !! I am sure this idea is receiving serious consideration from NCP. It has 2 advantages. The IPL can ask for (and will surely get) tax exemption and the money when allotted for irrigation can be pocketed by Congress/ NCP leaders. Even BJP might get a share considering the cordial relations between the heads of the 2 parties. Only the Sena will not directly receive any monetary compensation

Then there is the Srilankan player mess. People are saying don t mix politics with sports. Come on guys , be realistic. The successive heads of BCCI in the last 20 years have been all politicians& and the same for many other apex sports bodies ( remember Kalmadi ?). So how can one NOT mix politics with sports !!

The price of Indifference and an example from Karnataka.

The price of Indifference and an example from Karnataka.

Trashing politicians as corrupt and selfish is now a national past time for the Indian middle class. Not that our politicians are shining examples of honesty and competence. They are not. They are among the worst people you can ever think of.  But whining and complaining will not wish them away. But that’s what we do.. even result oriented  corporate go-getters become paralysed when it comes to doing something about politics.

Some of the best brains in India are trying to look for solutions, but no success so far… and no hope even remotely visible in the future. The way our political system has evolved it is now nearly impossible to get rid of the corrupt political class. Even a 100 well meaning Raul Gandhi’s and/ or  Narendra Modi’s will not be able to change the system. I may sound pessimistic, but if someone can tell me a way out I will be overjoyed and support that cause. The Lokpal Bill had some promise but when you ask a thief to pass the law , what can one expect !

So what  can one see happening for the next 25 to 30 years in India ?

• an annual GDP growth of 5% which will generate just enough surplus (which politicians will dole out ) to keep the poor from starvation and revolt.
• The BPL population, as currently defined ( income of Rs 30 approx per person per day) may shrink by 2 % per year.
• We will still be a “poor country” , nowhere near even middle income countries.
• this rate of growth will also provide huge monetary rewards to the political class and bureaucracy.
• Inflation in near double digits… the middle class / urban poor will get squeezed.
• Infrastructure improvement will move at a snails pace. Our large cities will become increasingly difficult and unsafe to live in.
• India will have the world’s third largest number of billionaires, most of them as a result of crony capitalism. If the “black money” billionaires are included (read politicians), we  may be second largest.

And all this will happen while we keep chanting “India is the World’s largest democracy.”

The only one thing that can upset the above scenario (it is a very low probability, but nevertheless good wishful thinking) is that the growing middle class may create a new , less corrupt political order. I give this event a probability of 5 % or less.

So clearly the  middle class will suffer a great deal. Now let us look inward. What have we actually done to change things. Have we encouraged our children to join politics ? No. Have we ourselves done it ? No. So, clearly ,  bad governance/ corrupt politicians  is the price we pay for indifference.

On the other hand look at the people who are in politics, an example form Karnataka. The Congress (and other parties too ) is distributing tickets for the upcoming assembly elections. . The crowd outside the Congress office is so large that the police has to be called in to control it. Ticket aspirants have hired people to shout slogans in their support. Existing  and aspiring MLAs who have been denied tickets are threatening to turn rebel. In short these people are very focused and very motivated. The rewards maybe uncertain but can often be huge, and that’s what drives these people.

Dynasty and downfall !

Dynasty and downfall !

This comes after seeing the movie Agnipath.. the one with Hrithik Roshan.

History repeatedly tells us of the downfalls of dynasties. In the older times it was only the dynasties of kings that were in evidence. But nowadays we see political and business dynasties too. What is about them that makes them fail ? 

There is a lot of research , specially on business dynasties and one popular theory is that typically  it takes 3 generations for the rise and fall. The first generation creates it, the second sustains and the third helps it demise. Rather like Brahma , Vishnu and Mahesh. Some of the reasons recorded for the downfall are lack of professionalisation/ nepotism and  complacence.  Post independence we have seen many “reputed” business families go into oblivion. The DCM group, and Escorts group are well known examples.. but there are probably  many more. I saw an article sometime back which said it was the “curse of the sons” .. which meant that businesses had to be divided to keep the sons in good humour and thereby the companies lost significant advantages. The Birla family was cited as an example.  DCM and Escorts certainly fit this theory. As a counterpoint, the article noted, the TATAs had prospered because in the last 2 generations the head of the business did not have any children.

Indian business families, have not yet learnt to separate ownership from day-to-day control, something western business families have done.

Coming back to Agnipath.. it is a horrible movie. The story, if there is one, has so many flaws that it looks like a patchwork with millions of squabbling incidents. The performances, barring Rishi kapoor , are mediocre. The Amitabh Bachan version was much better.

So how is this connected to dynasties..? Because Bollywood is mainly a dynasty business. Unfortunately genes have a will of their own and oftentimes  the child of a good actor parents might not be able to repeat the performance. I have said elsewhere that Bollywood will continue to churn out mediocre stuff till we have Kapoors, Khannas and Malhotras running it. Add to it Khans too. In fact the only good hindi films I have seen in recent times have been by “outsiders” like Anurag Basu , Anurag Kashyap, Tigmanshu Dhulia, Dibakar Banerji,  etc.

Without making this too long, let me just point out that dynasties in politics might even be the downfall of our country if we allow them to rule us.

Mr. Agrawal, I presume !!

Mr. Agrawal, I presume !!

It is my habit to watch people, especially at airports and railway stations.  TO look at their faces and guess where they come from. Or to look at their clothes and guess what they do for a living. I have also met several people who also do this people-watching.

What I try and do is to look at someone and guess where (which state/ region) the person comes from. Over a period of time I think I am correct about 70% of the time.  In the case of women, I find it easier to guess if they haven’t cut their hair short.

I have mentioned my guessing-game and my results (of 70 %) to several friends, but most have been skeptical about this. Now I am clear it is not a psychic ability. It is more like observation and logic put together.

The logic goes something like this. In a crowd of people of mixed races (White, Caucasian, Blacks, Indians, Chinese, Japanese etc) it is easy for anyone to make out the Mongoloid people (the most prominent feature is slit eyes). They would usually be from China, Japan, and Korea etc. Now most of us Indians can go no further than the Mongoloid identification. But a Chinese person can distinguish Chinese from Japanese from Korean because each has a bone structure/ skin colour / etc which is slightly different from the other. For instance the Chinese have round faces and a yellowish skin, whereas the Japanese have flatter and longer faces and a whiter skin.

As an example closer home, for most people, it is easy to identify Bengalis in a crowd. The logic is that each ethnic type shares a very high percentage of DNA which results in facial similarities. Interestingly we more easily recognize the similarities in people most dis-similar from us. So Europeans/ Americans think all Japanese people look alike, but to the Japanese all (white) Americans look alike.

I will end this post with a personal experience.

I was at Bangalore airport several years ago on a waitlisted ticket. It was waitlist 4. In those days it was the practice that about 30 minutes before flight departure, check-in would close for confirmed passengers and any available seats then would be allotted to waitlist people. The person at the check-in counter would call out the names of the waitlisted passengers, and if the passenger was present she would identify herself and get a seat.

Along with me I could see several more waitlisted passengers (You could always identify the waitlist passengers by their desperate, expectant and hungry look). There was one person there whom I noticed. He was wearing a jacket and must have been about 45. I looked at him and said to myself, this man has to be an Agrawal.  Soon the girl at the counter started announcing the waitlist.

Mr. XYX.. Mr. XYZ, waitlist Number 1. Well this XYZ had not turned up.

Mr. Agrawal, waitlist 2. Mr. Agrawal, Waitlist 2.

And the 45 yr old Mr. Agrawal in a jacket immediately raised his hand and rushed to the check-in desk!

A Samosa by any other name

A Samosa by any other name

I love samosas.. and if the accompaniment is chutney and chai.. the combination is unbeatable. I have been eating samosas on and off for at least 40 years, but only recently it struck me that though ubiquitous (and I did not quite know just how ubiquitous) and seemingly simple to make, not everyone can get it right.

The filling  has to be just right in ingredients and quantity. Too much filling and you feel as if you are eating a potato cutlet and if it is  too little, you feel you have been short-changed. The crust has to be made of maida (refined flour) and fried just right. Now I have eaten samosas in Pune, and the Puneites while good at Shrikhand  , can never get the samosa right. They use aatta for the crust.. and that makes it a very poor samosa…or an almost-samosa. And for some reason I am not able to quite fathom, in Pune it is called a Punjabi samosa. Luckily Punjabis are large hearted (and not uptight like Maharashtrians) , and haven’t filed a PIL against the Marathis for insulting them with this prefix “Punjabi” to the almost- samosa.

Further south, In Bangalore, the various Darshinis and Sagars (restaurants that serve South Indian food/ snacks ) also serve samosas. They don’t call it a Punjabi samosa, but they also can’t get it right. The crust is (as in Pune) is done in aatta and the ever present curry leaves are added to the potato masala. Well, this is also an almost-samosa.

Yet there are at least a couple of places I know  that you can get the the genuine article in Bangalore. One is Bhagatram on Comemrcial Street and another is Lakshmi Sweets in Marathahalli. I am sure here are many more. I think what makes the difference is the ethnic origin of the shop owner or cook. I have eaten samosas in Whitehall, London in a  Pakistani eatery, and hey were quite good.

Now thats what brings me to the second part. Where exactly did the word Samosa come from ? The word  does  not quite sound like Hindi / Sanskrit, nor is it Punjabi or any South Indian Language. So I looked up my friend Google Srinivasan. And here is what I was not-so surprised to find.

The word (and therefore the eatable) originated probably in Iran where it is called  sanbosag in Persian It is also seen in other countries : Sambosa in Afghanistan, sanbusak/ sanbusaj in Arab countries, samboosa in Tajikistan, samusa in Burma and sambusa in Horn of Africa (Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti).

Samosas have been around for about a 1000 years now. Amir Khusro (1253–1325), a scholar and the royal poet of the Delhi Sultanate, wrote in around 1300 that the princes and nobles enjoyed the "samosa prepared from meat, ghee, onion and so on". Ibn Battuta, the 14th-century traveller and explorer, describes a meal at the court of Muhammad bin Tughluq where the samushak or sambusak, a small pie stuffed with minced meat, almonds, pistachio, walnuts and spices, was served before the third course, of pulao..

 It is only in India , that the samosa is for the most part a vegetarian snack. Elsewhere it is usually filled with mince lamb or beef.

Have you ever been conned ? Part 2.

Have you ever been conned ? Part 2.

I am not writing this blog to expose the group of people who conned me, but just to record their ingenuity and acting abilities.

I guess this too happened within a few months of the first one. We were living in Domlur and late evening I had driven to the nearby market to buy veggies. This was before the traffic-mess days, so one was allowed to actually park there. It was dusk, actually more than dusk, just the last bit of light before night. I saw a slot that I could park into, but a man was sitting there. He was sitting on his haunches and looked like a villager. As I backed into the space, he got up and I parked.

 He had meanwhile joined a group of people, which had at least two women (in 30’s) two kids and one man. They had a number of bags with them, as if they were traveling. Just as I got out of the car, one of the men approached me and asked me if I knew Hindi. He explained that they were from some place in Maharashtra (their clothes confirmed this) and were labourers at some construction site. Their contractor had defaulted on wages and they wanted some money to buy tickets to go home as there was some festival (Diwali ?) approaching. They just wanted 200 rupees. It was a convincing story. Unfortunately I had only 50 with me. So I actually went to a kirana/ grocery  shop that I regularly bought from and borrowed 100 bucks and gave it them. Then I went back home and told my wife what had happened. We thought that I should go back and give them some more money. So I went back. But they were nowhere to be seen. I drove around but there was no sign of them. They had vanished. It surprised me because it looked like they would definitely have needed more than a 100 bucks to buy tickets and I had expected them to be still around asking other people for help. Anyway, they were not to be found and I came home.

Some time later, maybe more than an year, a similar group again approached me. They may even have been the same people. The size and composition of the group, their approach (do you know Hindi ? the contractor has not paid, etc), the timing (dusk) and their clothes immediately flashed the earlier experience to me, and I knew I had been conned then! Of course I wasn’t going to be fooled twice.

Since then I have been approached twice again (once in Ahmedabad!) by similar groups and in a complete action replay, and have on several occasions seen someone else being approached. It’s a neat trick and seems to work wonderfully well. 

I sometimes wonder if some enterprising person has an IPR on this and is franchising the whole con.

No minor vices This happened quite a few years ago when India was not so well integrated into the global economy. I was working for a company that had a foreign collaboration and one of the business executives from “Head Office” of the collaborator was visiting us in the factory in India. He was an important person for us. Along with a colleague (we will call him Gopal) I was to receive the visitor (who will be called Max ) at the airport, take him to his hotel and settle him in. Well Max arrived. He was mid-thirties, slim and blond with a good dose of American enthusiasm, a likeable sort of a guy. We had just started the ride back to the city from the airport when Gopal started asking Max about his family, mother, father brothers, sisters, uncle and aunts. I sensed that Max had not expected this line of conversation. Cross-cultural training/ sensitivity was yet to find roots on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Max answered with some hesitance that his father had married twice and thus he, Max, had a large number of siblings. We also came to know that he was unmarried. At some point of time Gopal asked Max whether he smoked . Max said he did not smoke. This was a big surprise for Gopal. He could not imagine an unmarried American who did not smoke, especially since tradition did not prohibit Max from smoking. Gopal then made a remark to me …”Yeh Max to bahut sant (saint) aadmi hai” and repeated the same to Max in English. As we were starting lunch, Gopal asked Max what he would like to drink. Max replied that he did not drink anything stronger than beer. Now this was too much for Gopal. An American in his thirties, who was not married AND did not smoke AND did not drink !!! Gopal repeated the saint dialogue in English to Max and me. I could feel Max distinctly uncomfortable with this newly conferred sainthood. Gopal just could not get over this rather “sainted” American, and soon enough repeated the saint dialog again. At this point Max interrupted him and said, “Look guys, don’t get wrong ideas about me. I am no saint. It’s true that I don’t smoke and drink, but I have a weakness for women”

No minor vices

This happened quite a few years ago when India was not so well integrated into the global economy. I was working for a company that had a foreign collaboration and one of the business executives from “Head Office” of the collaborator was visiting us in the factory in India. He was an important person for us.

Along with a colleague (we will call him Gopal) I was to receive the visitor (who will be called Max ) at the airport, take him to his hotel and settle him in.

Well Max arrived. He was mid-thirties, slim and blond with a good dose of American enthusiasm, a likeable sort of a guy. We had just started the ride back to the city from the airport when Gopal started asking Max about his family, mother, father brothers, sisters, uncle and aunts. I sensed that Max had not expected this line of conversation. Cross-cultural training/ sensitivity was yet to find roots on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. Max answered with some hesitance that his father had married twice and thus he, Max, had a large number of siblings. We also came to know that he was unmarried.

At some point of time Gopal asked Max whether he smoked . Max said he did not smoke. This was a big surprise for Gopal. He could not imagine an unmarried American who did not smoke, especially since tradition did not prohibit Max from smoking. Gopal then made a remark to me …”Yeh Max to bahut sant (saint) aadmi hai” and repeated the same to Max in English.

As we were starting lunch, Gopal asked Max what he would like to drink. Max replied that he did not drink anything stronger than beer. Now this was too much for Gopal. An American in his thirties, who was not married AND did not smoke AND did not drink !!! Gopal repeated the saint dialogue in English to Max and me. I could feel Max distinctly uncomfortable with this newly conferred sainthood.

Gopal just could not get over this rather “sainted” American, and soon enough repeated the saint dialog again. At this point Max interrupted him and said, “Look guys, don’t get wrong ideas about me. I am no saint. It’s true that I don’t smoke and drink, but I have a weakness for women”

Blue Blood-y Buggers: Indian Royalty

Blue Blood-y Buggers

For the last several years the media, specially the print media has been rather shamelessly lionising the erstwhile Indian royalty. So one is treated to pictures of palaces, stories of riches and glory and images of bejeweled and obese men and women.

So what is my take on this .? Here it is

At the time of independence, India was one of the poorest countries in the world. While one can lay some of the blame at the doorstep of the British, we must remember that in even when India became independent, there were some 250 plus "princely states" and kingdoms, ruled by kings of various degrees of importance and a uniform degree of dereliction of duty to their people. So this poverty was the outcome of centuries of exploitation and misrule. The palaces that one sees in glorious full colour reproduction were built while the people toiled and spent lives in darkness. While the kings in full regalia attended the Delhi durbar of Queen Victoria, or holidayed in the south of France, their subjects were starving to death. They shamelessly added to their coffers and built magnificent palaces while doing nothing for the public. And this mindless and unpardonable neglect of duty went on for several hundred years. Only the other day on some TV channel there was a documentary about a famous necklace owned by the Maharaja of Patiala. Among other things, it was recorded , that when he died he left behind 80 plus children from 20 or so wives. This king was so  f**_king busy, he could never have had time for any governance.

Finally, to add legendary insult to historical injury, some of the dynasties have claimed descent from Rama and some from Krishna.

Then came Independence, and at least some good sense prevailed. Or perhaps they made a virtue of an inescapable necessity. Barring a few exceptions (the most infamous being the Nizam of Hyderabad), the kingdoms agreed to join the Indian union. But they retained some of the privileges and properties and were given generous pensions by the government. In the time of Indira Gandhi's government, she abolished the Privy Purse and the pensions and the 'kings" squealed like indignant school children. They claimed that they had given "their own" property to the government and now they had been betrayed. How ridiculous. They should have been glad they were not guillotined as happened in the French Revolution.

In the years that went by, some of them joined political parties, but very few rose to any prominence. It was clear that the masses of India had had enough of them and did not want them back in power even if through election. Most of the rest sat around for some 20 years reminiscing the past and blaming fate. The Mysore ex-king kept jumping form party to party (an unusual case of party-hopping !!) , the favourite of the moment being the one that he perceived would help him get back his palaces. He even turned designer, hold your breath, designing of all the things, saris !!!

In conclusion, the only positive things that can be said about them are that some (very few) were good rulers and actually worked for the public good. And their myopic vision and constant internal bickering and fighting gave the British a chance to establish control over India. Without this , we wouldn't  have been an independent country.

Dho dala !! My story of washing machines

Dho dala !! My story of washing machines
 
I think in the last 20 or so years, no other household appliance has done as much for the Indian middle class home as the washing machine. My household goes into panic every time the machine breaks down.

As a child I had only heard that in far away lands there were machines that washed clothes and some years later I saw these huge things in laundry shops, but they were far from becoming household appliances even in the west. So when we got our first washing machine, somewhere in the mid eighties, there was a fair bit of excitement. It was a simple twin-tub (Videocons semi-automatic VNA 800) that did a reasonable job, but suddenly washing clothes became an entertainment rather than drudgery. I must have read the instruction manual several times over, with more interest than a best-seller and each time discovered a new feature.

We marveled at the high pitched hum of the dryer-tub and beamed happy smiles when the clothes came out nearly dry. We watched with satisfaction as the washing tub removed the dirt from clothes and the water turned a muddy grey-brown. It was as if the Ganga was washing away our sins and cleansing our soul. Even though the washer and dryer BOTH had automatic timers, we stood respectfully through the complete washing cycle. We traded out favourite moments-in-washing with friends and relatives.

More practically, the maid taking a few days off was no longer so dreadful. And I think the maid was also very happy that she no longer had to wash clothes, though she wasn’t as yet allowed to operate the machine.

Over a period of time, the twin-tub was replaced by a front loader. It washes better, the clothes don’t get mangled and one can use fabric-softeners and conditioners. But the initial romance has died. Running the washing machine is no longer as entertaining as it used to be. Also as its fully automatic, I don’t have to watch-and-wash.

Is it just me getting old or do I need a new more exciting washing machine ?

No Green cards for India

 No Green cards for India
Can you guess the number of Nepali citizens that live in India ? Well according to a reliable figure available from 1997 it was 1 million. The estimates for today vary from 2 to 3 million. That’s 20 lacs minimum… not a small number. While in the earlier years , they were mainly concentrated in the north , nowadays one can see them in the south too. According to a treaty between India and Nepal, citizens of either country do not require a passport/ visa to enter the other country. Almost all Nepalis in India do low level jobs such as watchmen and construction labour and domestics, and certainly don’t have a very high standard of living. But their numbers still keep increasing because conditions back home in Nepal are even worse. In many ways this parallels the migration of Indians from rural areas to cities and from poorer states (like UP and Bihar) to Mumbai.

So while educated Indian youth travel westwards for a better life, Nepalis come to India. Nothing wrong with either set, because the quest of a better life is undeniable. But look at the paradox. The Western/ developed nations (USA, Canada, Australia, Europe) with their very high income levels (USA per capita GDP is US 50,000/- compared to USD 2,700/- for India) have all kind of rules and regulations and restrictions to discourage immigrants. They, the West, only accept the best, most well qualified Indians and make it look like a favour. And while India does not have much wealth to share, for many years we have been sharing our poverty (not my words.. I think this is from Amartya Sen). Does it mean India has a heart ? A heart that is not all that small ? To me, yes, it does mean that, and among all the senseless politicking and communal violence and terrorist deaths, that’s at least one small comfort to me.

But we also have rabble rousers like Raj Thakeray and more generally the Shiv Sena and its various avataars , who, forget Nepalis , will not even accept Indians from Bihar and Nepal into Mumbai. What can one say about that, or do about that ?

Finally: Some time in the pre-liberalisation era , I had meeting with an Englishman. He was most upset that India had high customs duties and other trade barriers. He was a torch-bearer for free trade and I was his punching bag for all the ills of India’s trade policy. At one point I asked him, if the UK so strongly believed in free trade, why did they not allow Indian workers to feely enter the UK ? We had no further discussion.

The Great Indian Middle Class Cover up

The Great Indian Middle Class Cover up

A few months back I took a train to Kerala and saw a large number of “VIP” suitcases “covered” with olive green canvas … and thereby hangs a rat’s tale.

I guess I must have been in the 5th Std when some returning-from- “phoren” relative gifted our family a transistor radio.. and not just any radio..it was National Panasonic !! cutting edge Japanese technology of the time. As an aside, these were always called transistors.. never transistor radios.

The new transistor was a big change from the older (Philips) radio which would needed a warm-up before use , made guttural noises and sometimes whistled funnily for no reason. An additional plus point was that I (or my brother) could carry it to our room and listen to all the Vividh Bharati broadcasts of film songs..including the famous Jayamala, a program where AIR broadcast songs requested by soldiers from the armed forces.I am greatly indebted to the Lance Naiks, Sipahis and Subedars from 56 APO and Ambala cant for this early exposure to one of our great musical traditions. Come evening, the transistor would be appropriated by my father for the nine o’clock news (of Devaki Nandan Pandey and Lotika Ratnam fame). But I digress…

This transistor was about the size of a large dictionary and had shiny and smart looking knobs and dials. It had a built in antenna (aerial in those days) which could be folded . But it did not come with a factory made case. So in deference to the time worn tradition of our dusty land, a “rexine” cover was procured. It was black with a transparent plastic window. So the smart Japanese thing was now looking like a piece of Russian artillery. Thankfully the music was still as sweet. Somehow the aesthete in me did not take too kindly to this Russian intrusion, and at every available opportunity I would take the cover off to admire the Japanese beauty that lay beneath.

That was my first first-hand brush with this obsession of middle-class India to “cover” anything and everything in sight. Suitcases, televisions, washing machines, music systems, mobile phones, computers, telephone instruments, et al, ad infinitum. My mother cannot refrain from a disapproving glance if she sees something that does not have a cover. And so it has gone on. Products designed with passion and commitment by left-brain thinking Italian designers, long haired Japanese award winning designers and similar assorted persons with artistic souls are promptly “covered” by us In India. To add insult to designer injury, the covers are about as appealing as a badly made caramel custard. And then finally of course there are the people who will buy perfectly designed and expensive Japanese and German cars and never bother to remove for months the flimsy polythene film that covers the seats.

Rather tasteless, no ?